Melvin's blog

Nshima & Curry

Melvin's  Blog

Nshima & Curry

MATRIMONIAL ADS PROMISE SO MUCH

I recently found myself looking at Indian
matrimonial ads on the Internet, studying
them with more intensity than I ever studied
for an exam. There I was, absorbed in the
soothing paradise of matrimonial language:
"Young, slim and attractive ... highly
educated … good mix of eastern and
western values ... enjoy cooking Indian food
... great sense of humor ... friends say I look
like Aishwarya Rai …" Then a voice
suddenly shook me back to reality: "Melvin,
my dear son, please stop kissing the
computer!"

Actually, my mother would never come
between me and a potential bride. She’s
eager to see her 35-year-old son married.
So eager, she’s willing to consider
matrimonial offers from outside our culture,
even offers from outside our species.

So why am I still single? Well, finding a
perfect match isn't easy. It’s too bad I don’t
know any cricket players. I’ve heard they’re
really good at match-fixing.

Go ahead and laugh, those of you who think
you'll never be so desperate. Your time will
come. One of these fine days, you'll realize
that your "soulmate" isn't going to appear
out of the blue, that you won't run into him or
her at the local Indian restaurant, festival, or
sari shop. Even if you carry a sign that says,
"Marry me and my father will give you the
keys to his Mercedes."

Yes, you’ll soon realize that scanning
matrimonial ads is the only way to keep
your pesky relatives from setting you up
with one of your unemployed cousins. The
one whose main hobby, other than watching
Hindi movies, is smoking bidis.

In my younger days, I would have bet any
amount of money that I’d never have to look
at matrimonial ads for a wife. No, not me. I
knew that matrimonial ads are quite
common in Indian culture. That's how many
people hook up. But having grown up
abroad, I thought I’d be able to escape the
trouble of sorting through ads in which every
other woman is "beautiful," every other
woman is "fair" and every other woman is
"lying."

I was wrong, of course. I have recently spent
more time gazing at matrimonial ads than
I’ve spent gazing at actual women. Which in
itself is quite a miracle. My matrimonial
research, not surprisingly, has left me with
dozens of unanswered questions. Here are
just a few:

---What the heck is an INNOCENT divorce?
I've never heard anyone say they had a
guilty divorce. Maybe that's because people
consider marriage a life sentence. You
have to be innocent to be released. Or
perhaps the divorce court judge made a
ruling like this: "After considering all the
evidence, I find you, Mohan, completely
innocent. You have been unjustly punished.
Guards, please set him free from this
marriage. But I find you, Sharmila, guilty as
charged. You deserve to be punished. I
sentence you to three more marriages.
Guards, introduce her immediately to Mike
Tyson."

-- If you're a single doctor, is there some
kind of law that requires you to marry
another doctor? I've come across so many
ads in which doctors say they are seeking
other doctors. This confuses me. Do they
want to get married or are they trying to
open a clinic? Doctors marrying doctors
seems so unfair, because it deprives the
rest of us of free medical attention. All of us
deserve a spouse who knows how to work
on us. Medically speaking, that is. Some
doctors, perhaps desperate to get married,
are willing to consider engineers, computer
programmers and other professionals who
fall into the category of "not doctors but still
making tons of money". But many still insist
on marrying within their profession. Just
once in my life I'd like to see an ad that
says: "Parents of a 26-year-old physician
girl, educated at top medical college,
beautiful, fair, Hindu, U.S. citizen, seeking
responses from qualified janitors, truckers
and waiters. Preference will be given to
those with a high school diploma."

---If a woman is attractive, can she also be
homely? And if she is homely, can she also
be outgoing? And if she is outgoing, can
she also be reserved? And if she is
reserved, do I need to knock off the guy who
has reserved her?

---Why do people list the qualifications of
their relatives? "My brother is a medical
doctor, my father is an engineer, my sister
is a software professional, my uncle is an
accountant, my aunt is a professor, I myself
am a high school dropout."

I’m not trying to bash matrimonial ads. After
all, I’ve placed a few myself. And thanks to
them, I’ve met several terrific women,
including one special lady who has made
me stop looking at matrimonial ads
altogether. I really wish she’d move that gun
from my head.

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